The Flashman Papers: The Complete 12-Book Collection

by George MacDonald Fraser

  “They weren’t meant to flatter you,” says I.

  “The insults of an enemy are a tribute to the brave,” laughs he. “Think on what I have said, Flashman. And tell Elfistan Sahib.”

  He waved and rode back up the hill, and the last I saw of his troop they were following slowly on our flank, the tips of their spears winking on the snowy hillside.

  All that afternoon we toiled on, and we were long short of Khoord-Kabul when night came freezing down. The Afghans hung on our flanks, and when men – aye, and women and children – dropped by the wayside, they were pounced on as soon as the column had passed and murdered. The Afghans saw that our chiefs were not prepared to fight back, so they snapped at our heels, making little sorties on the baggage train, cutting up the native drivers, and scattering into the rocks only when our cavalry approached. Already the column was falling into utter disorder; the main body gave no thought to the thousands of native camp-followers, who were bitterly affected by the cold and want of food; hundreds fell by the way, so that in our wake there was a litter not only of bundles and baggage, but of corpses. And this was within a twenty-minute gallop of Kabul.

  I had taken Akbar’s message to Elphy when I rejoined the column, and it sent him into a great taking. He dithered and consulted his staff, and eventually they decided to push on.

  “It will be for the best,” bleated Elphy, “but we should maintain our relations with the Sirdar in the meantime. You shall ride to him tomorrow, Flashman, and convey my warmest good wishes. That is the proper way of it.”

  The stupid old bastard seemed oblivious of the chaos around him. Already his force was beginning to wither at the edges. When we camped it was a question of the troops simply lying down on the snow, in huddled groups for warmth, while the unfortuate niggers wailed and whimpered in the dark. There were some fires, but no field kitchens or tents for the men; much of the baggage was already lost, the order of march had become confused, some regiments had food and others none, and everyone was frozen to the bone.

  The only ones fairly well off were the British women and their children. The dragon Lady Sale saw to it that their servants pitched little tents or shelters; long after dark her sharp, high voice could be heard carping on above the general moan and whimper of the camp-followers. My troopers and I were snug enough in the lee of some rocks, but I had left them at dusk to help with the ladies’ tents, and in particular to see where Betty was installed. She seemed quite gay, despite the cold, and after I had made sure that Elphy was down for the night, I returned to the little group of wagons where the women were. It was now quite dark, and starting to snow, but I had marked her little tent, and found it without difficulty.

  I scratched on the canvas, and when she called out who was there I asked her to send away her servant, who was in the tent with her for warmth. I wanted to talk to her, I said, keeping my voice down.

  The native woman who served her came snuffling out presently, and I helped her into the dark with my boot. I was too cock-a-hoop to care whether she gossiped or not; she was probably too frightened, like the rest of the niggers, to worry about anything except her own skin that night.

  I crawled under the low canvas, which was only about two feet high, and heard Betty move in the darkness. There was a pile of blankets covering the floor of the tent, and I felt her body beneath them.

  “What is it, Mr Flashman?” says she.

  “Just a friendly call,” says I. “Sorry I couldn’t send in a card.”

  She giggled in the dark. “You are a great tease,” she whispered, “and very wrong to come in like this. But I suppose the conditions are so unusual, and it is kind of you to look after me.”

  “Capital,” says I, and without wasting more time I dived under the blankets and took hold of her. She was still half-dressed against the cold, but gripping that young body sent the fire running through me, and in a moment I was on top of her with my mouth on hers. She gave a gasp, and then a yelp, and before I knew it she was writhing away, striking at me, and squeaking like a startled mouse.

  “How dare you!” she squealed. “Oh, how dare you! Get away! Get away from me this instant!” And lunging in the dark she caught me a great crack on the eye.

  “What the devil!” says I. “What’s the matter?”

  “Oh, you brute!” she hissed – for she had the sense to keep her voice down – “you filthy, beastly brute! Get out of my tent at once! At once, d’you hear?”

  I could make nothing of this, and said so. “What have I done? I was only being friendly. What are you acting so damned missish for?”

  “Oh, base!” says she. “You … you …”

  “Oh, come now,” says I. “You’re in very high ropes, to be sure. You weren’t so proper when I squeezed you the other night.”

  “Squeezed me?” says she, as though I had uttered some unmentionable word.

  “Aye, squeezed. Like this.” And I reached over and, with a quick fumble in the dark, caught one of her breasts. To my amazement, she didn’t seem to mind.

  “Oh, that!” she says. “What an evil creature you are! You know that is nothing; all gentlemen do that, in affection. But you, you monstrous beast, presume on my friendship to try to … Oh, oh, I could die of shame!”

  If I had not heard her I shouldn’t have believed it. God knows I have learned enough since of the inadequacies of education given to young Englishwomen, but this was incredible.

  “Well,” says I, “if you’re accustomed to gentlemen doing that to you, in affection, you know some damned queer gentlemen.”

  “You … you foul person,” says she, in indignation. “It is no more than shaking hands!”

  “Good God!” says I. “Where on earth were you brought up?”

  At this, by the sound of it, she buried her face in the blankets and began to weep.

  “Mrs Parker,” says I, “I beg your pardon. I have made a mistake, and I am very sorry for it.” The quicker I got out of this, the better, or she might start shouting rape round the camp. I’ll say this for her, ignorant and full of amazing misconceptions as she was, she had appeared angry rather than frightened, and had kept her abuse of me down to a whisper. She had her own reputation to think about, of course.

  “I shall go,” says I, and started crawling for the flap. “But I may tell you,” I added, “that in polite society it ain’t usual for gentlemen to squeeze ladies’ tits, whatever you may have been told. And it ain’t usual, either, for ladies to let gentlemen do it; it gives the gentlemen a wrong impression, you know. My apologies, again. Good night.”

  She gave one last muffled squeak, and then I was out in the snow. I had never heard anything like it in my life, but I didn’t know, then, how astonishingly green young women could be, and what odd notions they could get. Anyway, I had been well set down, for certain; by the looks of it I should have to contain my enthusiasm until we reached India again. And that, as I huddled down in my blankets beside my troopers, with the cold getting keener every minute, was no consolation at all.

  Looking back on it now, I suppose it is funny enough, but lying shivering there and thinking of the pains I had been at to get Captain Parker out of the way, I could have twisted Mrs Betty’s pretty neck for her.

  It was a bitter, biting night, and there was little sleep to be had, for if the cold was not bad enough the niggers kept up a great whining and wailing to wake the dead. And by morning not a few of the poor devils were dead, for they had no more than a few rags of clothing to cover them. Dawn broke on a scene that was like something from an icy hell; everywhere there were brown corpses lying stiff in the drifts, and the living crackled as they struggled up in their frozen clothes. I saw Mackenzie actually crying over the body of a tiny native child; he was holding her in his arms, and when he saw me he cried out:

  “What are we to do? These people are all dying, and those that don’t will be slaughtered by those wolves on the hillside yonder. But what can we do?”

  “What, indeed?” says I. “Let ’em
be; there’s no help for it.” He was remarkably concerned, it seemed to me, over a nigger. And he was such a ramrod of a man, too.

  “If only I could take her with me,” says he, laying the small body back in the snow.

  “You couldn’t take ’em all,” says I. “Come on, man, let’s get some breakfast.” He saw this was sensible advice, and we were lucky enough to get some hot mutton at Elphy’s tent.

  Getting the column under way was tremendous work; half the sepoys were too frost-bitten to be able to lift their muskets, and the other half had deserted in the night, skulking back to Kabul. We had to flog them into line, which warmed everyone up, but the camp followers needed no such urging. They were crowding ahead in panic in case they should be left behind, and threw Anquetil’s vanguard into tremendous confusion. At this point a great cloud of mounted Ghazis suddenly came yelling out of a nullah in the hillside, and rode into the mob, cutting down everything in their way, soldiers and civilians, and made off with a couple of Anquetil’s guns before he could stop them.

  He made after them, though, with a handful of cavalry, and there was a warm skirmish; he couldn’t get back the guns, but he spiked them, while the 44th stood fast and did nothing. Lady Sale damned them for cowards and hang-backs – the old baggage should have been in command, instead of Elphy – but I didn’t blame the 44th myself. I was farther down the column, and in no hurry to get near the action until Anquetil was riding back, when I brought my lancers up at the canter (true to life, Tom Hughes, eh?). The guns were going to be no use to us, anyway.

  We blundered along the road for a mile or two, with troops of Afghans hanging on our flanks and every now and then swooping down at a weak part of the column, cutting up a few folk, snatching at the stores, and riding off again. Shelton kept roaring for everyone to hold his place and not be drawn in pursuit, and I took the opportunity to damn his eyes and demand to know what we were soldiers for, if not to fight our enemies when we saw them in front of us.

  “Steady on, old Flash,” says Lawrence, who was with Shelton just then. “It’s no use chasing ’em and getting cut up in the hills; they’ll be too many for you.”

  “It’s too bad!” I bawled, slapping my sabre. “Are we just to wait for ’em to chew us up as they please, then? Why, Lawrence, I could clear that hillside with twenty Frenchmen, or old ladies!”

  “Bravo!” cries Lady Sale, clapping her hands. “You hear, gentlemen?”

  There was a knot of the staff round Elphy’s palankeen, with Shelton in the middle of them, and they were none too pleased to hear the old dragon crowing at them. Shelton bristled up, and told me to hold my place and do as I was told.

  “At your orders, sir,” says I, mighty stiff, and Elphy joined in.

  “No, no, Flashman,” says he. “The Brigadier is right. We must preserve order.” This, in the middle of a column that was a great sprawling mass of troops and people and animals, with no direction at all, and their baggage scattered.

  Mackenzie, coming up, told me that my party and his jezzailchis must flank the column closely, watching the likely places, and driving in hard when the Afghans appeared – what the Americans call “riding herd”. You can guess what I thought of this, but I agreed heartily with Mac, especially when it came to picking out the most likely spots for attack, so that I could keep well clear of them. It was simple enough, really, for the Afghans would only come where we were not, and at this time they were less interested in killing soldiers than in cutting up the unarmed niggers and pillaging the baggage animals.

  They made pretty good practice at this during the morning, running in and slitting a throat and running off again. I did pretty well, halloo-ing to my lancers and thundering along the line of march, mostly near the headquarters section. Only once, when I was down by the rearguard, did I come face to face with a Ghazi; the fool must have mistook me for a nigger, in my poshteen and turban, for he came yelling down on a party of servants close by and cut up an old woman and a couple of brats. There was a troop of Shah’s cavalry not far off, so I couldn’t hang back; the Ghazi was on foot, so I let out a great roar and charged him, hoping he would sheer off at the sight of a mounted soldier. He did, too, and like an ass I tried to ride him down, thinking it would be safe enough to have a swipe at him. But the brute whipped round and slashed at me with his Khyber knife, and only by the grace of God did I take the cut on my sabre. I drove on past him, and wheeled just in time to see one of my lancers charging in to skewer him beautifully. Still, I had a good hack at him, for luck, and was able to trot up the line presently looking stern, and with my point impressively bloody.

  It had been a lesson to me, though, and I took even greater care to be out of distance whenever they made a sortie out of the hills. It was nerve-racking work, and it was all I could do to maintain a bold-looking front as the morning wore on; the brutes were getting braver all the time, and apart from their charges there was an uncomfortable amount of sniping taking place.

  At last Elphy got fed up, and ordered a halt, which was the worst thing he could have done. Shelton swore and stamped, and said we must push on; it was our only hope to get through Khoord-Kabul before dark. But Elphy insisted we must stop and try and make some sort of peace with the Afghan leaders, and so stop the slow bleeding to death of the army at the hands of the harassing tribesmen. I was for this, and when Pottinger spotted a great mass of Afghans far up the slope, with Akbar at their head, he had no difficulty in persuading Elphy to send out messengers to him.

  By God, I was sorry to be on hand when that happened, for of course Elphy’s eye lighted on me. There was nothing I could do about it, of course; when he said I must ride to Akbar and demand to know why the safe-conduct was not being observed, I had to listen to his orders as though my guts were not dissolving inside me, and say, “Very good, sir,” in a steady voice. It was no easy task, I can tell you, for the thought of riding out to meet those ruffians chilled me to the backbone. What was worse, Pottinger said I should go alone, for the Afghans might mistake a party for an attacking force.

  I could have kicked Pottinger’s fat backside for him; he was so damned full of self-importance, standing there looking like Jesus Christ, with his lovely brown beard and whiskers. But I just had to nod as though it was all in the day’s work; there was a fair crowd round, for the womenfolk and English families naturally clung as close to Elphy’s presence as they could – much to Shelton’s annoyance – and half the officers in the main body had come up to see what was happening. I noticed Betty Parker, in a camel howdah, looking bewildered and mimmish until she caught my eye, when she looked quickly away.

  So I made the best of it. As I wheeled my pony I shouted out to Gentleman Jim Skinner:

  “If I don’t come back, Jim, settle Akbar Khan for me, will you?”

  Then I clapped in the spurs and went at the slope hell-for-leather; the faster I went the less chance I stood of getting picked off, and I had a feeling that the closer I got to Akbar Khan the safer I should be.

  Well, it was right enough; no one came near me, and the Ghazi parties on the hill just stared as I swept by; as I came up towards where Akbar sat his horse before his host – for there must have been five or six hundred of them – he waved to me, which was a cheering sight.

  “Back again, prince of messengers,” he sings out. “What news from Elfistan Sahib?”

  I pulled up before him, feeling safer now that I was past the Ghazi outliers. I didn’t believe Akbar would let me be harmed, if he could help it.

  “No news,” says I. “But he demands to know if this is how you keep faith, setting on your men to pillage our goods and murder our people.”

  “Did you not tell him?” says he, jovial as ever. “He himself broke faith, by leaving Kabul before the escort was ready for him. But here it is –” and he gestured at the ranks behind him “– and he may go forward in peace and safety.”

  If this was true, it was the best news I had heard in months. And then, glancing past him at the ranks behind,
I felt as though I had been kicked in the stomach: immediately in his rear, and glaring at me with his wolf smile, was my old enemy, Gul Shah. Seeing him there was like a dash of cold water in the face; here was one Afghan who did not want to see Flashman, at least, depart in peace and safety.

  Akbar saw my look, and laughed. Then he brought his horse up closer to mine, so that we were out of earshot, and said:

  “Have no fear of Gul Shah. He no longer makes mistakes, such as the one which was almost so unfortunate for yourself. I assure you, Flashman, you need not mind him. Besides, his little snakes are all back in Kabul.”

  “You’re wrong,” says I. “There are a damned lot of them sitting either side of him.”

  Akbar threw back his head, and laughed again, flashing those white teeth.

  “I thought the Gilzais were friends of yours.” says he.

  “Some of them,” says I. “Not Gul Shah’s.”

  “It is a pity,” says Akbar, “for you know that Gul is now Khan of Mogala? No? Oh, the old man – died, as old men will. Gul has been very close to me, as you know, and as a reward for faithful service I granted him the lordship.”

  “And Ilderim?” I asked.

  “Who is Ilderim? A friend of the British. It is not fashionable, Flashman, greatly though I deplore it, and I need friends myself – strong friends, like Gul Shah.”

  Well, it didn’t matter to me, but I was sorry to see Gul Shah advanced, and sorrier still to see him here, watching me the way a snake watches a mouse.

  “But Gul is difficult to please, you know,” Akbar went on. “He and many others would gladly see your army destroyed, and it is all I can do to hold them back. Oh, my father is not yet King again in Afghanistan; my power is limited. I can guarantee you safe-conduct from the country only on conditions, and I fear that my chiefs will make those conditions harsher the longer Elfistan Sahib resists them.”

  “As I understand it,” says I, “your word is pledged already.”

  “My word? Will that heal a cut throat? I talk of what is; I expect Elfistan Sahib to do the same. I can see him safe to Jallalabad if he will deliver up six hostages to me here, and promises me that Sale will leave Jallalabad before your army reaches it.”